This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. Primary support for the subproject and the subproject's principal investigator may have been provided by other sources, including other NIH sources. The Total Cost listed for the subproject likely represents the estimated amount of Center infrastructure utilized by the subproject, not direct funding provided by the NCRR grant to the subproject or subproject staff. Human periventricular white matter injury (PWMI) is the predominant form of brain damage and the leading cause of life-long neurological disability from cerebral palsy in survivors of premature birth. In the premature human brain there is a window of vulnerability when hypoxia-ischemia (H-l), maternal-fetal infection and other insults damage cerebral white matter. We propose to define novel mechanisms in perinatal rat and human by which acute white matter injury leads to disruptions in the neurovascular unit at the level of the extracellular matrix that disrupt normal myelinogenesis. We are testing the overall hypothesis that the predilection of the preterm white matter to chronic myelination disturbances after H-l is related to the acute degeneration of preOLs that triggers chronic reactive astrocytosis. Our preliminary data suggest that reactive gliosis leads to the accumulation of the glycosaminoglycan hyaluronan (HA) and that HA can block preOL maturation. We hypothesize that reactive astrocytosis prevents the normal maturation of the residual pool of susceptible preOLs, arrests normal myelination and results in a persistent state of increased vulnerability of the white matter with delayed preOL death through a mechanism that involves HA accumulation.